Post navigation

It’s funny how closet production photos always advertise a person who doesn’t exist. I don’t really work with anyone who only has 3 shirts, 2 skirts, a pair of pants, and a few choice pieces of evening wear.

I could probably declutter the average person’s closet with a gun to their head and they STILL would have to order about 50-100 new space saving hangers to move forward with the project. Of course you can make a closet look great and work extremely well, but people generally don’t have just 2 pairs of shoes.

So how do you deal with all that stuff?

Here are some suggestions:

1. Get better hangers.

If you are still suffocating your closet space with big, wooden or plastic hangers, you are doing yourself a disservice. Get the smallest, thinnest non-slip hangers you can find. I personally like Non-Slip Velvet Hangers in Ivory (Courtesy of Amazon).

2. Use shelf dividers.

People like to be hugged. So do objects. If you have bags or boots that simply love flopping over, use shelf dividers. These Acrylic Shelf Dividers (Courtesy of Amazon) are my favorite.

3. Adjust your shelves.

A lot of people I work with have adjustable shelves in their closet and surprisingly few actually take advantage of it. The goal here, as it is in all organizing, is access. If you are a shorter person like myself, you do not want to have a permanent footstool hanging out in the closet nor do you want to feel as though you are doing yoga trying to reach a piece of clothing on your shelf. So if you have the option, just unpeg the little pegs and adjust the shelf. I suggest lowering shelves as much as possible and fitting them to the exact object you plan to place on each one. Ideally, you don’t want to have to reach too high above you for an object you use every day. So, be the boss and kindly direct the shelf to a happier place.

Your walls are begging to be used. They don’t care how. Shelving, command adhesive hooks, magnetic strips, tacks, whatever. Vertical space is so underused most of the time. Give your walls the affection they are dying to lavish on you. Start simple. Use Command Adhesive Hooks (Courtesy of Amazon).

There are a lot of common things I hear in my job. The phrase “I’ve been looking for that!” is all too familiar. The phrase “I think I’m a hoarder” is also well worn. But the thing that I never quite get used to, the thing that always still causes me some pain to hear is the blame. I cannot count how many times I’ve heard “Well… YOU always do THIS!”, “It’s her fault!”, “He can’t seem to ever”, etc. I have seen deep pain in children whose parents blame them for their issues and deep sadness in parents whose children blame them for theirs. I’ve seen spouses practically divorce one another over the coat closet.

Putting fault on others is an outlet. It is an outlet for the shame we feel for not doing the very thing we are angry about. It is much easier to point outwards than to look inwards. But think about those times when someone has really impacted you. They probably didn’t do it through blame or accusation. They probably did it by example. They lived by example.

Your choices are the only freedom you have. If you want to elicit change in someone else, you must set the example.